Gigi Hadid, photographed at the Plaza hotel in a Legacy Suite, in New York City.

Gigi Hadid, the 20-year-old international modeling sensation and daughter of a Real Housewife of Beverly Hills, was born to be in front of the camera. Almost literally. When she was still in diapers, she scored her first ad campaign, for Guess Kids. Her mother, Yolanda Foster, a Dutch model and veteran cast member of Bravo’s Real Housewives franchise, put her career on hold while Hadid attended Malibu High School. But once Gigi graduated—class of 2013—and calls from the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue and Tom Ford started coming in, Foster morphed into a blond-haired, Kris Jenner-esque momager and began grooming her daughter’s career.

Forgive the Kardashian reference, but in the tangled web of Beverly Hills family trees, the clans are related: Foster’s current husband, David Foster, was formerly married to Caitlyn—né Bruce—Jenner’s second wife, Linda, who came before Kris Jenner. Does that make Gigi and Kendall Jenner ex-step-siblings-in-law? “Yes. Wait. I don’t know. We’re just best friends,” she says with a sigh. Along with Kendall Jenner and Cara Delevingne, Hadid is part of a new breed of supermodel. Unlike their 1990s predecessors, who steadily climbed to the top with years of editorial shoots and runway shows, these girls quickly muscled their way into the upper echelons with social-media followings blazing. (Hadid has more than 4.5 million Instagram followers.) “Now it’s very much a lifestyle, which I know sounds kind of cheesy,” she says of the blurred lines between hard work and real life. “It’s not a nine-to-five job. You’re on set for 15 hours and then you go home and make sure you’re posting the right stuff on social media and then you answer your e-mails. It never stops.” She means that literally: “Yesterday, I was approached by a 13-year-old girl in the bathroom at the airport for a selfie.” She took it.

Apart from photo shoots and contracts with brands such as Maybelline, Hadid is focused on two things now: First, she’s on a one-woman hunt for the best cheeseburger in New York. “In the last year, I’ve tried to try a new burger every week. Right now, my favorite is from J.G. Melon.” Her other cause is promoting strength in female friendships. Or in the language of social media: #girlsquad. Hadid’s close pals are fellow models Karlie Kloss and Delevingne, and the ultimate starlet bestie, Taylor Swift, whose Hyde Park concert Hadid stormed arm in arm with Jenner last June. “It’s really fun that we get to share our friendship on social media. We support each other and we inspire each other.” Hadid also wants us to know that despite their millions of followers—not to mention the millions of dollars each earns annually—her #girlsquad is just like any other. “It’s hard to get us all in the same room,” she says, “but when we do we’ll have a cooking night at someone’s house and talk for hours. Then we all get on a different plane the next day.”

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